End of 1982 Consent Decree: GOP can finally contest vote fraud after 36 years

Did you know that since 1982, the Republican Party had been legally prohibited from contesting elections due to suspected vote fraud, because of a legal agreement called the Consent Decree the GOP made with the Democrat Party?

TRENDING ON DC CLOTHESLINE:

Finally, 36 years later, a judge has ended the agreement, freeing the Republican Party to ensure electoral integrity by investigating and pursuing suspected vote fraud.

Betcha you never heard or seen this truly momentous news in the Left-infested mainstream nedia. Why’s that?

THE 1982 CONSENT DECREE

As I explained in my post of November 15, 2012, “Why the GOP won’t challenge vote fraud,” in 1981, during the gubernatorial election in New Jersey (NJ), a lawsuit was brought against the Republican National Committee (RNC), the NJ Republican State Committee (RSC), and three individuals (John A. Kelly, Ronald Kaufman, and Alex Hurtado), accusing them of violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), 42 U.S.C. §§ 1971, 1973, and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States.

The lawsuit was brought by the Democratic National Committee (DNC), the NJ Democratic State Committee (DSC), and two individuals (Virginia L. Peggins and Lynette Monroe).

The lawsuit alleged that:

The RNC and RSC targeted minority voters in New Jersey in an effort to intimidate them.

The RNC created a voter challenge list by mailing sample ballots to individuals in precincts with a high percentage of racial or ethnic minority registered voters. Then the RNC put the names of individuals whose postcards were returned as undeliverable on a list of voters to challenge at the polls.

The RNC enlisted the help of off-duty sheriffs and police officers with “National Ballot Security Task Force” armbands, to intimidate voters by standing at polling places in minority precincts during voting. Some of the officers allegedly wore firearms in a visible manner.

To settle the lawsuit, in 1982 — while Ronald Reagan was President (1981-1989) — the RNC and RSC entered into an agreement or Consent Decree, which is national in scope, limiting the RNC’s ability to engage or assist in voter fraud prevention unless the RNC obtains the court’s approval in advance.

The two parties agreed that “in the future, in all states and territories of the United States,” they would:

(d) refrain from giving any directions to or permitting their employees to campaign within restricted polling areas or tointerrogate prospective voters as to their qualifications to vote prior to their entry to a polling place;

(e) refrain from undertaking any ballot security activities in polling places or election districts where the racial or ethnic composition of such districts is a factor in the decision to conduct, or the actual conduct of, such activities there and where a purpose or significant effect of such activities is to deter qualified voters from voting; and the conduct of such activities disproportionately in or directed toward districts that have a substantial proportion of racial or ethnic populations shall be considered relevant evidence of the existence of such a factor and purpose;

(f) refrain from having private personnel deputized as law enforcement personnel in connection with ballot security activities.

The RNC also agreed that the RNC, its agents, servants, and employees would be bound by the Decree, “whether acting directly or indirectly through other party committees.”

To put it bluntly, the Consent Decree in effect gave a carte blanche to the Democrat Party to commit vote fraud in every voting district across America that has, in the language of the Consent Decree, “a substantial proportion of racial or ethnic populations.” The term “substantial proportion” is not defined.

In 1987, the Consent Decree was modified to define “ballot security activities” as “ballot integrity, ballot security or other efforts to prevent or remedy vote fraud.”

Since 1982, the Consent Decree had been renewed every year by the original judge, Carter appointee District Judge Dickinson R. Debevoise, who, even after he retired, returned every year for the sole purpose of renewing his 1982 order for another year. Debevoise died in August 2015.

Flash forward to December 1, 2017, when the Consent Decree was due to expire.

According to NJ.com, the Democrat Party tried to extend the Consent Decree, claiming that the 2016 Trump presidential campaign had colluded with the RNC in voter intimidation efforts, and that Trump’s commission to examine suspected Democratic voter fraud was, in the words of Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), “a thinly veiled voter suppression effort”.

But Sean Spicer, who had been a top RNC official before entering the Trump White House as spokesman, testified there was no collusion of the Trump campaign with the RNC, and that the RNC had stayed away from all 2016 election day activities, including any voter-intimidation, voter-suppression or ballot-security efforts. Nor did any party officials discuss voter fraud allegations with the Trump campaign. Spicer said:

“It had been abundantly clear for the six years that I worked at the RNC that the RNC and its employees were prohibited from engaging in Election Day activities, including poll watching, so I intentionally stayed away from all of that.

The [RNC] counsel’s office had been vigilant in informing both senior staff and subordinates on the importance of the consent decree and the activities that we were clearly should not be engaged at or be even perceived as engaging in. And so we had grown accustomed to not even coming too close to a line that would in any way, shape, or form lead one to believe that we were engaged in those activities.”

RNC lawyer Bobby Burchfield said Spicer’s testimony proved there was no collusion and asked the presiding judge, U.S. District Court Judge John Michael Vazquez, to allow the 1982 Consent Decree to expire.

As reported by NJ.com on January 9, 2018, Judge Vazquez ruled that the Democratic National Committee did not prove that the RNC violated the Consent Decree prior to its Dec. 1, 2017, expiration date.

And with that, Judge Vazquez, an Obama appointee, ended that noxious 1982 Consent Decree legal agreement between the RNC and DNC which had tied the Republican Party’s hands from contesting elections and investigating vote fraud for 36 years.